Support our work
CIMMYT works to improve livelihoods and foster more productive, sustainable maize and wheat farming in low- and middle-income countries. Our portfolio squarely targets critical challenges, including food insecurity and malnutrition, climate change and environmental degradation. Our multidisciplinary teams work on large-scale projects and in close collaboration with partner organizations.
CIMMYT greatly appreciates the contributions of funders, and we thank you for your continued support and partnership. Our innovative and world-changing work would not be possible without you. Our strategic intentions focus on combating hunger, poverty, land degradation, and the effects of climate change in key agroecological systems more effectively and broadly over the next 10 years. To do this, we will establish new and expanded scaling-oriented partnerships supported with funding of US$1.2 billion over the next five years and US$3 billion over the next decade.
Our vision and impacts
We continue to be inspired by Norman Borlaug’s motto, “Take it to the Farmer,” combining the right seed with the right farming practices and embedded in integrated markets while recognizing and leveraging farmers’ knowledge.
We strive to attain a world with healthier and more prosperous people, more resilient agrifood systems, and freedom from food crises. We act through four flagship programs: maize research, wheat research, genetic resources, and sustainable agrifood systems that encompass other cereals such as sorghum and millets, legumes and pulses. The programs combine scientific excellence, strong and long-lasting partnerships, and rigorous capacity building to combat food insecurity and climate change in the developing world. High-level impacts of our work include the following:
- Documented benefits in the Global South of US$3.5 to US$4 billion annually – and significant spill-over effects for farmers in the Global North.
- Breeding contributions to 50% of the wheat and maize varieties grown worldwide.
- Capacity building that has benefited nearly 75,000 women and men farmers and agricultural experts, through 2,700 training and capacity building activities in more than 18 countries.
New opportunities
Whilst our current programs deliver significant sustainable intensification, regenerative agriculture and breeding and seed systems-driven benefits, we want to engage funding partners in realizing further strategic opportunities which include:
- Expand crop management approaches that reduce greenhouse gas emissions and use land, water, energy, nutrients and labor more efficiently.
- Act as innovation provider of sustainable agriculture development that is inclusive, provides improved livelihood options, and reduces drudgery, thanks to responsible sourcing and environmentally-friendly policy environment-building, enabling long lasting innovation.
- Build greater farming household agency through Advisory services, such as nutrient expert, disease monitoring, e-agrology, yield gap, global N atlas and benchmarked information.
- Increase the participatory engagement with farming communities, especially smallholder farmers who represent 30-40% of GDP and 65-70% of the labor force in Africa, a huge resource.
- Build Living Labs infrastructure with farming communities with our Regional On-Farm Testing (ROFT) networks.
- Provide nutritious cereal and legumes-based food options for low-income consumers.
- Ensure that the biodiversity of maize and wheat is used more widely and equitably, by more effectively linking our Gene bank with breeding pipelines, using novel scientific approaches in plant breeding and agriculture in general: genomics, phenomics, enviromics and gene editing, which provide an avenue for greater impact.
- Provide technologies and know-how to farmers and local entrepreneurs, helping them to become agents of economic growth.
- Develop the capacity of individuals and institutions in partnership with CGIAR Centers, world-class universities, national agricultural research and extension systems and via innovative research collaborations with innovative private-sector partners, including start-ups and the humanitarian sector.
Our Case for Support provides a rationale for these research-for-development (R4D) intervention domains and their funding. CIMMYT implements its R4D work as part of larger CGIAR Research Initiatives and thanks to bilaterally-funded projects and programs. CIMMYT aims to attract funding for multi-year, multi-country, transdisciplinary interventions, positively impacting local and regional innovation systems. Our R4D is guided by realistic scaling pathways, thanks to our development and funding partners.
For more information please contact Victor Kommerell on V.Kommerell@cgiar.org.
